Blast to the Past.

Here’s a story I wrote a couple months ago that I really had fun with. The working title was “the palimpsest in the synchrotron,” which I loved, just because I got to use the words “palimpsest” and “synchrotron” in the same sentence. Over and over again. Just try saying it aloud, and you’ll see what I mean: “The palimpsest in the synchrotron.” Fun, isn’t it?

To decode da Vinci, you need a firm grasp of art. To learn from Archimedes, you need to get your hands on something a bit more sophisticated. Like a synchrotron that accelerates electrons to nearly the speed of light to produce x-rays. At least, that’s what scientists at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center are using to reveal works by the ancient Greek mathematician that are hidden in 1,000-year-old parchment.